Escaping the Everyday

The scariest part of this whole adventure was the decision to make this huge life change. Deciding to quit our full-time jobs and travel for two years. There were so many things to think about, things we didn’t even think we needed to think of because it’s not something we dealt with every day.

The biggest question was, can we actually do this or is it just a dream? So, we started writing out all of our questions. There were going to be certain requirements we needed to meet in order for me to feel comfortable making this change. I didn’t want to do this trip if we would just be stressing over money or still living our everyday typical lives with jobs, but we also needed income while on the road.

Of course, our questions didn’t end there….

What about health insurance? A permanent address? Selling a car? Where would we live? What about my Ella? Continuing our 401(k)s? Can we cut expenses somewhere? Can we not dip into our savings and still save?

I mean the list of questions kept going. Not only did we need to figure out these things, but it was also going to be an adjustment in general. We needed to sacrifice in order to make this work, but it really brings things into perspective. Do we really need apple music, Spotify, a bunch of streaming services?

“Life is so short”

I mean we all know this and hear the quote all the time, but do we really act on it? It occurred to me that making great money is nice and comforting but it’s not everything. If you don’t have your health or time, money doesn’t mean anything! My mom passed away before she was 40 years old and my dad was diagnosed with dementia in his early 60s. I don’t live in fear, but I want to live my life to the fullest. I do not want to look back and be like dang, I wish I did something while I was young and could make the change.

Jake received his bachelor’s degree when he was 27 years old after struggling with his addiction for many years. After getting sober on January 19, 2021, receiving his degree, and landing a job in his field, he had a huge realization. His addiction took many years of his life where he wasn’t able to live his life to the fullest. He wants to experience life, doing the things he loves such as skiing out west, hiking, and exploring.

So we decided that we wanted to build a life where we wouldn’t stress over money, being on a budget and living our lives by traveling.

The Actual Decision!

After working through all of our questions and our budget, we made our plan! We would be going to stay in a state for 3 months utilizing short term rentals. When we landed our first place to stay, it really sunk in that we were doing this.

So, guess what?

We are off to MONTANA! We plan to head to Yellowstone National Park and Glacier National Park. Those are the two main places we know we are going to explore but it’s going to be fun to meet locals and explore the towns and cities along the way.

The best part about all of this is we’ll be taking you all with us! I’m going to be blogging about our journey along the way. It’s hard to stay in touch with everyone on a consistent basis so I figured this be the best way and I love blogging. It’s a win win!